The SensorPush Hygrometer

Being EU based , US proto factories are not the best option usually, but thanks anyway for the link.
Ds

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Found this around 10$ on e-bay, ordering to see if the App is in English or Chinese only.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Mi-Smart-Temperature-Humidity-Sensor-Smart-Socket-Plug-WiFi-Remote-with-Xiaomi-N/283159087781?var=583566316127

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The photos make this thing look huge, it is not (36 x 36 x 11.5 mm). Here is a video:

Can’t beat that price. Although, this sensor is part of a home automation suite and, as such, it does not operate stand-alone. It is using ZigBee (as opposed the Bluetooth LE) and will require a gateway. Which is not a bad thing, just that the $10 price is a bit deceptive if you only need one or two of these and don’t already have a gateway. If you have a large number of sensors (such as a number of individual curing containers), this would make for an affordable option. I may order a set-up to try this out.

•Temperature measuring accuracy is -0.3 - 0.3 degree
•Humidity measuring accuracy is -3 - 3 percent
•Temperature range: -20 - 60 Deg.C

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Yeah I did notice it looks to only run by WIFI, but also that it can work with a small humidifyer unit.

Dunno if it will work, but for 10$ it’s worth a try.
Just ordered a single unit, as I before have experianced to buy “smart” units on ebay.
And they only come with chinese software/app’s and instructions.

IKEA have a cheap ZigBee compatible gateway
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Ikea-Tradfri-Gateway-Zigbee-Hub-Echo-Philips-Hue-Compatible-smart-Lighting/273534226059?hash=item3fafe90e8b:g:A-YAAOSwj6lbyj1U:rk:29:pf:0

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Thought I’d post an update graph for 5 containers / Sensorpush hygrometers:

Nice variety of starting moisture levels. By far, the two containers (orange and blue) that were more “moist” at the early stage have the best jar smell at this point. Of course, those two containers have content from the same plant, so the reason is not definitive but interesting.

Target RH is around 62%. When relatively stable at that RH, adding Boveda packs.

Also, interesting is that I have some trim (not part of this experiment) that’s sitting out and dried to a crisp, also smells delicious. And, some in the compost pile, delicious too. Hmmm.

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Interesting data.

Why do you suppose some are trending up and some down and one almost dead level? Im assuming the spikes are when you open the jars?

Is it just the Bovida packs or something else going on? Im ignorant of this whole process - I have never cured any weed.

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Different amounts of “dryness” before they were put into the jars. Target is lower 60% and I’m manipulating the “burping”, adding humidity packs, etc to get there.

I do have Bovedas in the “dry” jars but they were not added at the beginning. Even though the cure started dry on some of the jars, they continued to release moisture from within the buds to the surrounding atmosphere. Like a crusty loaf of bread. Wrap it in cellophane and it’ll soften right up as the moisture from the core moves outward.
I have not been “burping” the dry jars nearly as long or as often as the “wet” jars.

The middle one actually started about a week earlier and it is cut off on the graph, it has since increased slowly by a couple of percent but it did stay relatively stable. I’m thinking a Boveda pack was added to the green trace on the 4th. I didn’t record the date.

I give the jars a shake, open them to exchange the air. So, in part, moving them around seems to release increase the humidity. I’ll check if just shaking the jars lightly without opening them has an effect.

edit: just moving the bud around without opening the jar does cause a spike. I’ll watch it for a bit to see what it does.
edit: yea, it looks like the jostling of the buds damages enough tricomes to increase the RH in the jar. The humidity does spikes and the resultant RH tends to stabilize at/or near the higher humidity level. Not by much, but it is noticeable.

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Was curious, were you eventually able to get the Mi Smart Humidity sensor to work with the IKEA Gateway?

I only just got the Mi sensor, haven’t picked up a IKEA Gateway yet.
But I have been looking into it, and from what I read it should be possible to flash it.

As it is, the IKEA gateway won’t connect with other item’s then IKEA’s apparently.
So it might be a cheap way, for a heavy DIY project. But it don’t look like, it’s as easy as first thourt.

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I checked the calibration of my humidity gauges by going outside on a dry windy day. I leave it out on the porch and then I check the weather info on the internet to get the local humidity.

It’s important, many of the cheap little hygrometers are WAY off. I was using Oregon Scientific ones that turned out to be 20 points too low and I lost a crop to mold because of this. A friend gave me little ones intended to go inside jars and they were also about 20% off.

it’s one of those items where it’s nearly impossible to find a quality instrument. There’s a million hygrometers for $10 and no good expensive ones…edit OK I found this…400 bucks though!

edit found a couple more good ones for <$100

http://www.thomassci.com/Instruments/Hygrometers/_/THOMAS-TRACEABLE-JUMBO-HUMIDITYTEMPERATURE-METER?q=Humidity%20Probe

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I have 2 sensorpush devices in route. I should have them Monday. Looking forward to replacing my crap hygrometers in my tents

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I’ve been seeing a lot of growers promoting the new Pulse unit and it makes me wonder – are they being paid to push this product? First it was the Dude Grows Show talking about it every day, and now I’ve seen 3 different Insta-growers talking about them in the past week.

When comparing against SensorPush the only real difference is they track light levels and VPD on top of temp and RH. I just cannot justify the extra expense. A single SensorPush + Wifi gateway will run about $150 with each additional sensor costing $50. These new Pulse units are $199 EACH.

Can anyone else find a reason for the extra cost here? Anyone think this is worth testing?

(I won’t be replacing my setup, since I’m far too deep into SensorPush at this point.)

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I saw it advertised on strainly, too. Sounds like it.

Would be interesting to play with one. Basically, wifi + temperature + humidity. Light is probably an on/off measurement. VPD is simply performing some math on the temperature and the humidity.

The advantages appear to include a nice UI, tracking, and alerts. All integrated. It is unclear if the API is open to allow integration into a larger control system, eg. providing a data interface API. Or, if there is a “cloud” requirement.

Personally, wouldn’t work well in my application, curing in jars. The smaller devices are applicable for that. For a grow-areas, it’s interesting. Need to know more.

FWIW, calculation of VPD is relatively straight forward with the information that the sensor push gives you. Just needs the temperature and the humidity. For instance,

Eventually we’ll have the framework here for a significantly more advanced and open version. Topics tagged sourcecode

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Yeah I have been manually doing VPD for quite a while using my SensorPush data, I think that’s one of the ways they’re selling this unit to growers. Simply a marketing ploy to charge an additional hundred bucks.

I did grab your VPD code a while back and I plan on converting it to C# once I get a break from the holiday web traffic. If only there were a few more hours in the day… :slight_smile:

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That was my first thought, as well. Price point, well, I don’t think it’s unreasonable. It appears that they have a lot of work invested in making a polished product.

Cool! You did mention that and I promptly forgot :slight_smile: Please let me know if you run into any problems or issues when you get to trying that.

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next level sw guy stuff nice. ha ha wire guy here.

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Some samples from one year of monitoring with Boveda packs:

Temperature is first graph, humidity is the second graph in each of the following:

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First harvest out of two, ~10 days hang dry, then trim/bottle.

Showing the extremes between two phenos, one is too wet other is bit dry.

Wet, burping. Too wet. Will probably dump it out to bulk dry further:

Went in somewhat dry, haven’t burped it yet as I want to see how far the humidity will increase on its own:

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i love the sensorpush, i have one in each of my rooms and they offer me a piece of mind. last year i had an extraction fan fail and the temp limit warning saved me from burning up a 4x4 tent. soon ill get the gateway so i can monitor anywhere. do you use the gateway or are you bluetooth only?

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I have a gateway set-up near the sensors (currently nine sensors). In that way, I don’t have to bring a bluetooth capable tablet/phone within range of the sensors in order to log the readings. Been running for about a year and has been maintenance free.

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